Home tunes for the Lightning XL

[silentshot1 206]

Just got off the phone from two local gunsmiths, both saying they'll need 3 - 4 weeks for a retune of my 'boingey' Lightning XL at around the £50 - £60 mark.

 

I've seen you can buy DIY mainspring and tuning kits for roughly that and was wondering if this was a viable alternative for a reasonably technical mind (My wife's, not mine, mine's filled with excuses as to why I should be out with the gun and not in town suffering yet more shopping plus also idea's of what could be achieved with a simple mix of Kelly Brook and some Angel Delight!).

 

Does anyone know if these are worth it and if so, which one. I've seen them offered from Bonnie and Clyde, V Mach, Chambers (Ultra Tune), etc. All at roughly the same price but I wouldn't know which was the best.

 

Thanks for any thoughts, I'm off to see if any pigeons fancy meeting Big Bertha (HW77) for a spitting competition in the white stuff!

[air gunner 0]

If the lightning is anything like a supersport then it is really easy to dismantle. You need to make a spring compressor there are a few designs on the net if you look. what i did to start with was to remove the internals and give a good degreasing with petrol. (make a clean surface first to prevent dust etc getting into contact with the internals) i then polished the piston with wet and dry sand paper and assured that i cleaned all metal particles off. check the seal and make sure it is not broke or worn out. check your gun has a spring guide if not buy one from chambers (i think they sell them) polish the surfaces at which the spring ends touch. i bought a normal bsa spring it is fine after you polish the ends to mirror finish. after a few weeks of using the tuned rifle it was good however a nice man had a good deal on a gas ram so i got that and it did my gun even more good. however a gas ram in my opinion does benefit from having a silencer/moderator as the pop is louder in my opinion. im still not sure on what oils/ greases to use but i have used silicone grease on the rubber seal. (im not sure if this is wise but hey its working. for the spring i used moly paste on the ends and on the metal parts of the piston this makes a decent noise reduction by its self.

[air gunner 0]

On although i have never actually used a v-mach tune i have done lots of research when i was looking for solutions and found that v-mach had very good reports and are very well thought of.

[wuzzy 0]

got a good tuning guide but its a bit long winded hope you enjoy reading :

 

 

Tuning The Older Springer

 

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ALL WORK DONE USING THIS INFORMATION IS AT YOUR OWN RISK - APPLY COMMONSENSE TO YOUR WORK AND SEEK ASSISTANCE FROM A QUALIFIED GUNSMITH IF YOU GET OUT OF YOUR DEPTH. Use a spring compressor and be careful!

 

If you want your old or new-to-you old spring-piston rifle to give you its best then you could try the following tune-up. It takes a bit of patience and elbow-grease and dosen't involve any drastic modifications but if you follow it carefully your rifle should shoot sweetly afterwards for a good long time.

 

The following is a basic tune for spring-piston rifles which was common in the late 1970s and early 1980s. The idea is to make the rifle as smooth and consistent as possible, and does not involve modifying the rifle in terms of piston weights, top hats, etc, that is for the more advanced airgunsmith. I used this on a Feinwerkbau Sport recently and it would cut 7mm groups at 25 yards from a rest, and in my 30 year old BSA Meteor which does 10ft/lbs and 20mm groups with a standard spring so it seems to work OK. The guide refers to a rifle with a leather washer, obviously don't soak the washer in silicone oil if it is of a synthetic material, just wipe a small drop of SM50 over it before assembly.

 

For the full works you will need:

 

new spring

new piston washer and buffers if fitted

new breech washer

 

Can of Dri-Slide (or Gun Slide from Chambers) or tube Molykote GN paste

Abbey LT2 molybdenum grease (J.S.Ramsbottoms has this)

Abbey SM50 oil (J.S.Ramsbottoms has this)

Abbey Silicone oil (J.S.Ramsbottoms has this)

 

Solvol Autosol metal polish ( a car accessories shop like Halfords or a hardware store)

Methylated spirit or white spirit

Very fine abrasive paper

Cheap toothbrush (unused)

18†length of broomhandle

Couple of packets unused ‘J’ cloths or similar

 

The idea of the tune is to make sure the bearing surfaces are smooth and appropriately lubricated, with the aim of consistent mechanical action giving consistent velocities without dieselling and so giving good accuracy. The molybdenum in the Dri-Slide binds to steel giving a very slippery hard surface.

 

IT IS ABSOLUTELY ESSENTIAL THAT YOU CLEAN ALL THE PARTS COMPLETELY AFTER POLISHING THEM WITH ABRASIVE PAPER OR METAL POLISH. Use newspaper under the parts as you work and throw them out as they are soiled. Have a clean area to put your clean parts and don’t do ‘dirty’ work next to them. Be careful with naked flames and the hair-drier, the methylated spirit and the carrier element in the Dri-Slide ar e both highly inflammable. WORK IN A WELL VENTILATED ROOM OR WORKSHOP.

 

1. Place the new piston washer in a pellet tin or similar receptacle and pour over Abbey silicone oil to cover it completely. Leave to soak overnight.

 

2. Disassemble the rifle, taking care to store small parts so they don’t get lost.

 

3. THE COMPRESSION CHAMBER

 

A. Degrease all the parts and the inside of the compression chamber using the meths. The broomhandle should have a 3†slot cut in one end so that a stip of J cloth can be slid in and wrapped round to give a cleaning head. Be very thorough, and keep using fresh strips of J-cloth until they start coming out completely clean. Check that the transfer port is clear by using a non-metalisc implement like a cocktail stick and examine carefully by eye. Use the toothbrush and methys to clean the threads that the rear cylinder block screws into. Dry the inside of the compression chamber using further J-cloth strips.

 

B. If you feel it necessary you can remove the sharp edges on the inside and outside of the cocking-slot. Pack the compression chamber with cloth and using a spatula or table-knife with the fine abrasive paper wrapped around it smooth the inner and out edges of the slot. Don’t overdo this, just remove the sharp EDGES from the slot. Degrease again and be meticulous about removing all the metal filings and abrasive dust using methys and J-cloths. Remove the packing cloth and degrease again until you are sure all the dust has been removed.

 

C. Using a hair-drier, warm the compression tube by blowing hot air inside and outside the tube body. When it is warm, pour a tablespoon-size amount of Dri-Slide into the compression chamber and roll the chamber around so that the liquid coats all of the surface of the chamber and also further back in the area above the cocking slot. Be careful not to lose all the Drislide out of the tranfer port! The chamber can be left to dry for a couple of hours or overnight. Alternatively, rub in some Molykote GN paste onto the whole surface of the inside of the compression chamber.

 

D. When you are ABSOLUTELY SURE IT IS DRY, use a tightly-wound long piece of J-cloth on the broomhandle, burnish the surface of the compression chamber thoroughly. Alot of the Dri-Slide will appear to come off, but it is leaving behind a layer so dont worry.

 

4. THE PISTON

 

After disassembling the piston, degrease it inside and out as above, using meths and J cloths. Polish any scratches on the piston body out using the fine abrasive paper, using a rotary action i.e. turning the piston on its axis and holding the paper still so the mark is polished out in a ring around the piston. Polish the whole of the outside of the piston with Solvol Autosol, particularly the back of the piston where it makes metal-to-metal contact with the cylinder wall. Use a J-cloth and to apply and polish off the Solvol. Carefully polish the surface of the bent (part of the piston which engages the sear) with Solvol on a J-cloth drawn tight over something flat and rigid (e.g. a small file). Degrease and clean with meths. Heat the piston up with the hair-drier and coat the inside AND the outside of the piston with Dri-Slide as with the compression chamber, except you don’t need to polish it in afterwards, just leave the coating as it is.

 

5. THE SPRING

 

Take a peice of the fine abrasive paper and place it on a very flat surface e.g. a suitably strong piece of glass or steel plate. Polish polish the flat ends on the paper until they are shiny. You can make this a mirror finish if you then polish the ends using Solvol Autosol on cloth stretched over the plate. Degrease and clean the spring carefully afterwards.

 

6. THE PISTON GUIDE

 

Degrease inside and out and polish out scratches using a rotary action using the fine abrasive paper and then Solvol Autosol to give a shiney surface. If you like, pad a vice and use a file to remove the sharp edges on the base of the guide. Degrease and clean as above. Make sure you clean the passage through the middle of the guide and get rid of any old grease and dust in there.

 

 

ASSEMBLY

 

1. Take the piston washer that has been soaking in the silicone oil and squeeze it dry using a J-cloth. Fit it to the piston, avoid getting any lubricant on the screw/bolt attaching it to the piston body. Smear a couple of drops of SM50 around the base of the leather washer (away from its face).

 

2. Take a lollipop stick and smear a stripe of LT2 grease about 1†in width around the back of the piston (trigger end), be fairly generous.

 

3. Fit the piston back into the compression chamber, easing the piston head into the chamber gently. It may be a little bit swollen at this point, but persist in easing it in and don’t use hammering or excessive force. Line up the cocking slot in the piston with the one in the compression chamber.

 

4. Using a small pad of J-cloth, apply a thin smear of LT2 grease to the outside of the spring and a generous layer to one flat end. Fit the spring into the piston with the greased end forwards.

 

5. Apply a liberal amount of LT2 grease to the outside and INSIDE of the spring guide and fit it to the end of the spring.

 

6. Smear a little LT2 grease on the threads of the back-block and use this to compress the spring and reassemble.

 

7. Reassemble the rest of the rifle using LT2 grease on all the main points of wear. Apply SM50 oil to the trigger by dropping it into the mechanism, allow the excess to drip out before reassembly. Replace the breech washer with a new one, and clean the barrel in the normal way. Make sure all the stock screws are tightened appropriately (not too loose, not too tight).

 

 

The rifle may be a little bit smokey the first ten or twenty shots but should then settle down to be very consistent. All that is needed in terms of lubrication after this is a drop of two of SM50 at the joints occassionally, and once every 1500 pellets or so a drop of SM50 ***BEHIND*** the piston washer, which can be done by removing the stock and putting the oil in through the cocking slot. Leather washers can take a long time to bed in, so I recommend doing alot of plinking, like two or three tins of pellets, before the gun reaches its peak. Then you should be able to shoot the rifle for thousands of pellets without doing anything more than slip a new spring in occasionally and a sparing use of SM50.

 

CAUTION: Do NOT over-lubricate. Stick to the amounts indicated here - less is more, especially with polished bearing surfaces.

[andyfr1968 772]

The best tune up for a Lightning is to PX it for an HW99.....

 

Edit... Sorry.

Edited December 22, 2009 by andyfr1968

[kev1986 0]

i ued to shoot with somebody who owned a lightning xl and they are really twangy he stripped it down and it was dry as a bone inside and quite shabby engineering inside so he just gave it a full strip down polish and regrease and it is a lot better still got a twang but no to bad i not to sure but have been told that they have been getting made in spain for a while now so that could be reason for standards dropping , i jst had my lightning mk1 tuned and it very smooth and no twang just a solid thud i had it stripped polished new piston seal,breechseal,spring,guide,tophat and weight it still aint no daystate dont get me wrong but i match my mates aa prosport no prob so its about as good as it gets for a springer nd groups 1" at 30yards